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The Subcontractors BlueprintAuthor: Jacob Austin
Welcome to "The Subcontractors Blueprint," the essential podcast for construction industry Subcontractors. Join host Jacob Austin, a seasoned Chartered Surveyor with a rich background in industry giants and the founder of QS.Zone. This show is your key to mastering commercial savvy and contract finesse. Gain the knowledge and skills to manage accounts, understand rights, and boost profitability as an SME sub-contractor. Jacob's expertise guides you through risk management, cashflow maintenance, and maximizing subcontract profitability. Tune in now to empower your subcontracting journey with "The Subcontractors Blueprint" and take confident strides toward a more prosperous future. Language: en Genres: Business, Courses, Education, Entrepreneurship Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it |
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Get More Men On It!
Monday, 12 October, 2026
Episode 164 of The Subcontractors Blueprint sees Jacob Austin explain the obligation to proceed regularly and diligently, and what it does not require of you. Running late because the trade in front of you ran late is not a failure to proceed diligently, and a main contractor cannot shorten your period by reissuing his programme. Jacob covers where the obligation genuinely bites, why constructive acceleration rarely succeeds under English law, the narrow route that has worked, and the paragraph to send when somebody at a site meeting asks you to put more men on it. KEY TAKEAWAYSWhat regularly and diligently actually measures, and why being late is not the same as being in breach. When a reissued main contractor programme becomes your obligation, and the one paragraph that stops it. Why the cost of speeding up without an instruction is close to unrecoverable. The four things a successful acceleration claim has needed, and the one nobody ever does. Why cutting your gang back in protest hands the contractor a claim against you. How ninety minutes of correspondence protects a five-figure sum. BEST BITS "Money that you spend speeding up when nobody's specifically instructed you to speed up is really hard to recover.""Lateness caused by somebody else's delay is not a failure to proceed diligently.""A main contractor cannot unilaterally shorten your programme by redrawing the bar chart.""Being helpful without covering your back is going to cost you money.""Whether a notice goes down like a lead balloon or whether it's received like a helpful piece of advice is all in the wording.""That single habit could save you a fortune." HOST BIOJacob Austin is a Chartered Quantity Surveyor with over a decade of experience in UK construction, having worked across education, health, and residential developments from £1,000s to over £300m of concurrent projects with some of the industry's leading contractors. Through The Subcontractors Blueprint podcast and The Subcontractors Blueprint Academy, he's on a mission to give the UK's 1 million SME subcontractors the commercial knowledge they need to protect their margins, manage risk, and build stronger businesses. His approach is direct, practical, and grounded in real contract experience — no theory, no fluff. LinkedIn — www.linkedin.com/in/jacob-austin/ Instagram — www.instagram.com/subcontractorsblueprint/ www.subcontractorsblueprint.uk/all-links
